
Team Dunstone celebrates after a 7-4 win over Brad Gushue's Team Canada rink at the Brier in Kelowna. Dunstone, (top R) who lives in Kamloops, leads a team including Colton Lott (top L), 2nd E. J. Harnden (bottom L) and brother Ryan Harnden (bottom R)
Even though they were the top team headed into the tournament, the Manitoba foursome led by Kamloops-based skip Matt Dunstone is finding the right time to kick in that extra gear, as they are off to the gold-medal match-up tomorrow afternoon at the Brier in Kelowna.
Dunstone and his team, including Colton Lott and the Harnden brothers, E.J and Ryan, were winners once again Saturday evening in their 2nd clash of the tournament with Brad Gushue’s Team Canada rink.
The game didn’t necessarily start out in Dunstone’s favor, as he took a single in the 1st, essentially giving up the hammer advantage, with Gushue able to score a deuce in the 2nd.
But Dunstone and the rest of the squad would hold tough, countering right back with two of their own in the 3rd to send a message to the Gushue rink that they weren’t going anywhere.
From there, they would trade singles — with Dunstone’s side dictating most of the action — until the 6th, where Dunstone would take over on strategy, keeping things clean to force Gushue into a single in six.
Team Dunstone would then hold hammer through 7 and 8, then took their advantage in 9 with a critical two points to go up 6-4.
Solid stones in the 10th by the entire Dunstone side would leave Gushue with a next-to-impossible double takeout, which didn’t convert, giving Dunstone and his crew the direct line to Sunday afternoon’s final at the Brier.
This is the 2nd time for Dunstone at the helm of a team in the Brier final.
While lead Ryan Harnden is tearing it up for Dunstone’s team, curling at a blistering 94%, Dunstone is also having a solid tournament, curling at 88%, but having those numbers skewed by a couple of blown guards and a freeze.
But Dunstone — on skip stones, is throwing where it matters, with a 92% rating on draws, and an 86% shooting rate on raised takeouts, including a spectacular shot in the round robin against the fellow Manitoba rink, skipped by Reid Carruthers.
Dunstone, Lott and Ryan Harnden come into the final having lost to Gushue in the gold medal game in London, Ontario 2 years ago.
E.J. Harnden joined the team in December.
Despite beating the defending champs twice so far this tournament, Dunstone wouldn’t go as far as to say they’ve “got their number” this year.
“I think what’s special about this group is it hasn’t matter who we’ve played. We bring the best version of ourselves, and we’re really hard to beat,” said Dunstone in a conversation with Radio NL after the game. “You don’t expect to have their [Gushue Rink] number with how good that team is. But we know on the flip side that when we play our best, we’re a really hard team to beat.”
With the direct line to the finals, Dunstone will get to watch the semi-final match-up between Gushue and Brad Jacobs out of Alberta, who is into the semi-finals after getting past Reid Carruthers Manitoba rink 6-5 earlier in the day in the other qualifying match-up.
Jacobs’ rink was the only undefeated team in the round robin but ended up losing to Gushue in the 1-2 initial play-in game, meaning his Alberta rink has been forced to come through the hard way to get to the rematch with Gushue at 11am on Sunday.
On top of helping lead his team a win on Saturday night, Dunstone was also able to give them a bit of a chuckle as well…
When you’re a little too excited to get to @MontanasBBQ to grab some ribs
#Brier2025 pic.twitter.com/UVzvuEPiV4
— Curling Canada (@CurlingCanada) March 9, 2025
While his rink curls out of Manitoba, Dunstone calls Kamloops home, and has for the last number of years.
So, not unsurprisingly, he should have the home ice advantage when the finals start Sunday at 5pm.
“I heard a couple of people yelling at me tonight during pre-games, telling me they were there from Kamloops,” chuckled Dunstone when asked about crowds, which have been averaging about 5,000 per round at Prospera Place.
“Got a lot of friends and family coming up from Kamloops, and obviously my side of the family has come up here too from Winnipeg,” noted Dunstone.
“We have a lot of support. Feels good to have some of the crowd behind us.”